Okay, so what are the good superhero comics these days?

More to come!

A good chunk of the comics I like are superhero in one way or another...Grant Morrison's Invisibles and New X-Men, Ennis's Preacher and Hellblazer, recently Hellboy. You'd like probably like Millar's current miniseries Wanted a whole lot (it's all about the corrupt moral viewpoint so far).

Others: Brian Vaughn's Y: The Last Man and Runaways, Fables, Human Target, Warren Ellis's Transmetropolitan and Planetary.

The "Ignition" arc in the Flash #s 201 through 206 was really good. A rare dark and urban tale for DC secondmost primary-coloured hero. Er, unless you count Wonder Woman. But whatever.

I sorta like what's going on in Green Arrow lately, but I think that's mainly cuz I've always really liked the character, and he's finally being allowed to sorta be as awesome as it was always hinted he was.

The Outsiders seems pretty good. I just picked up the trade of the first few issues. Sorta of an X-approach to updating the old New Teen Titans of the early 80s, which were pretty cool. The writer (Judd Winick) hasn't quite got a handle on the language thing. He's trying to make it a "mature-language" book, but sometimes it just seems too forced.

The DC: New Frontiers miniseries is pretty fun, but a little pricey.
The "imaginary story" JSA: The Liberty Files is pretty cool, has Batman and some second-stringers as Gov't Agents during and shortly after WWII. Has one of the best "otherly" takes on Superman in a long time.

Other than that, blah. I've finally let go of Green Lantern.

I'ma go with some of these recommendations. More welcome.

I'll report back with some findings after I read.

Anything by the writer Brian Michael Bendis is pretty good (he also does Daredevil). I'd check out his Powers trade paperbacks also.

The last two-three years of X-Statix and New X-Men have been classic -- but again, there's so much backstory you'd have to go back to the start of Grant Morrison and Pete Milligan's runs.

The Kevin Smith Green Arrow paperback in suprisingly well done. And the last few years of the Punisher have been good fun -- this is all stuff you could sit and read in Borders.

Alan Moore's Promothea and LXG are probably the best, most original supehrero titles of the past decade... but again, you have to start with the pbks.

With the exception of Bendis, I'd say the same writers that are good now are the ones that were good 10-15 years ago. Neil Gaiman's the only one I'm really embarassed to have liked.

What's Promethea like? I always see it, but I've never read it and I never hear anything about it.

re: the Promethea/LXG, I'll add Top Ten. Sort of like LXG, except a bit more futurey, less concerned with literariness in favor of FUN. The only Alan Moore that I unequivocally like, btw (and for that, I'm banning myself from posting on ILC).

Jordan, Promethea is a superheroine sieved through myth and legend which stories include heavy doses of the occult. Which ought to be something I'd lap up, but it's a bit dry and academic for me.

With X-Statix/X-Force, I have all the Milligan ones, if/when I see you, I could lend.

QUEEN & COUNTRY. Not so spandexy, but an espionnage thriller about a team of crack MI:5 agents. Actually, I just want a Brit to judge the authenticity of the dialogue.

BTW, Chuck's comment re: the good writers now are the same from 10 years ago + Bendis totally gives the high hat to folks like Ed Brubaker (Catwoman, Sleeper, Gotham Central), Greg Rucka (Wonder Woman, Queen & Country), Brian K. Vaughn (Runaways, Y: The Last Man, Mystique), Mark Millar (nominally, depending on my mood), Peter Milligan (X-Statix, Human Target), Warren Ellis (Planetary), Sean McKeever (Mystique), etc etc etc.

Based on your original list, Skillz, here's some recommendations w/ context (and there's gonna be some redundancy here) (titles w/out easily accessible trade paperback collections will be asterisked):

a) Punisher ==> Gotham Central (Batman cop procedural), Sleeper (super-powered spies), Powers (super-powered cops), Caper* (Jewish gangster story), Queen & Country (see above), Losers (Mission Impossible-type shenanigans), 100 Bullets (pulp fiction), Daredevil (law & order spandex), Alias (private dick spandex, not like the TV show), Mystique (blue-skinned shape-changing spy stuff, more like TV's Alias)
b) Lobo ==> Hellboy, The Goon* (both are pulpy dry monster-bashing comix; Hellboy's slightly more goth, while The Goon is definitely more slapstick)
c) X-Men ==> Outsiders (Huckelbuck is OTM), The Ultimates (hello corrupt world view!), Top Ten (the entire series was swank), Stormwatch: Team Achilles* (clunky title, but stuff goes boom; best stuff hasn't been collected yet), The Authority (I can only vouch for the Warren Ellis / Bryan Hitch runs), Astonishing X-Men* (upcoming title; supposedly a "throw back" to the "good old days"; written by creator of Buffy & Angel), Supreme Power (building a modern-day superhero group from the bottom up; Marvel's "realistic" version of the JLA), Runaways (possibly THE one title tapping the old school chummy Claremont X-Men / Wolfman & Perez New Teen Titans vibe w/out making like grave robbers)

Plus-Arseface!

Thanks to everyone who recommended stuff. I'm going to check out as many as I can. Though David's last post is rather frightening to me. Eeep!

The Ultimates - reimagines the Avengers, only funnier, more subversive and with amazing art & action scenes. Best Hulk scenes ever in comics. Seriously.

Supreme Power - a slooow burn but worth it for the level of detail and the solid characters and nice art.

Invincible - funny soapy spin on the genre with great characters and good one-liners...

Planetary - tackles a different pop-cultural legend every week (usually in the form of an analogue) but always a nicely crafted read, and still gripping a few years in.

Catwoman - great reinvention of a tired old character, great writing.

Daredevil - the best its been in years, original, gripping, almost novelistic.

Ultimate Spiderman - for basic superhero thrills, its doesnt get any better...

A minor note: Mark Millar's best work, his run on Swamp Thing, started just over 10 years ago.

A major note: Peter Milligan was arguably past his best work 10 years ago. Bad Company, Rogan Josh, Hewligan's Haircut, Skin, the better part of Shade, and Enigma are all pre-1994.

Preacher trade (first one)
latest Queen & Country
latest Ultimates
latest Daredevil (couldn't find #56!)
The first Flash of the ones that Horace mentioned
Outsiders #10
Punisher The End thing (mentioned on Chuck's other thread)
new Lobo Unbound (hmmmm...)
Hellboy corpse story thing
Newest Hellblazer
Start of most recent Uncanny X-Men storyline
First part of "Wanted" (the only one they had! And I couldn't find anymore!)

Didn't get, but wanted to:

New X-Men (didn't know where to start, and latest ones aren't Morrison, so...)
The Goon (a bit pricey, plus I spent over $60 so I had to stop somewhere!)
The Shield comic (not mentioned on this thread, and probably CRAP, but I'm a HUGE fan of the show and I wanted it anyway)
Caper (sounds great, but I couldn't find it!)

Didn't like the look of:
Promethea (you all say it's good, but it looked a bit..."faux-mystical" and I wanted grit)

Questions:
When is this "Astonishing" X-comic out?
What happened to Cable?

I haven't read any of them yet, but I'll let y'all know what I think.

The back issues of The Ultimates were also going for some serious coin.

I think the Astonishing/Joss Whedon book comics out next month, and I have no idea if Cable is hanging around in any of the X-books (New X-Men was the only one I bothered with).

I did think it was nice of them to put that cover on the new New X-men. I might have accidentally picked it up if it weren't for the ugliest cover ever.

I think the first issue of Astonishing is coming out this month? It's coinciding with the whoop-dee-doo Reload thing, where all the non-MK X titles get a boot in the ass, and an assload of new titles join the fun. To wit:

Uncanny X-Men (Claremont / Alan Davis)
X-Men (formerly New X-Men - Chuck Austen / Salvador Larocca)
Astonishing X-Men (Whedon / Cassaday)
District X (Bishop-centric series)
Cable / Deadpool (self-explanatory, and answers yr question)
whatever they're gonna change New Mutants to
AND MORE!

As for the X-Statix: Chuck, do you mean what's happening in the stories, or its publication? Cos the new ish came out a few weeks ago and I haven't heard anything about a cancellation.

xpost with Dave

Haha, I was waiting for some pendant to say something like this! It's okay, dude! I can deal!

The Marvel imprints, to my knowledge, are as follows:

- the non-imprint imprint (where most comics are slotted)
- Marvel Knights (in continuity w/ above; used to be where Joe Quesada & Jimmy Palmiotti revamped characters & series w/ a high rate of success; bullshit semantics re: "edginess" now rule, tho the editor - Alex Alonso - is a good 'un, and helped spearhead Marvel's resurgence when Quesada became Editor-In-Chief)
- Marvel MAX (Mature Readers Only; not sure about continuity)
- Marvel Age (kiddie stuff - Silver Age stories redone Manga stylee & excellent in-continuity shenanigans like Runaways)
- Ultimate Marvel (separate continuity; reimagined origins & characters; not sure re: the 'letterboxing' of the covers, but you're right, they aren't comely by any stretch)
- Marvel Icon (COMING SOON home to creator-owned stuff like Bendis' Powers & Mack's Kabuki; has Sweet FA to do with anything in Marvelverse)

Why are they doing it? Perhaps they want to fragment an already insular sub-culture by asking, "what kind of Marvel Zombie are YOU?" Or maybe they're just trying to get away with publishing nothing but superhero books by setting up arbitrary borders.

What are the good mainstream superhero comics these days?

I just realized, on the ILE Christian Bale Batman thread, that although I still read superhero comics, I read few of the ones I read when I first got into comics. I used to be hugely into Batman and the Avengers, for instance -- on the other hand, I loved Mark Waid's Flash but haven't liked the title since, any time I've checked it out.

I read the Spider-Man titles and the Ultimate Fantastic Four thing cause I got a free subscription to that when I renewed Ultimate Spidey. I've been reading The Outsiders. But that's it, for Marvel/DC big guns. And for the record, I've never liked Geoff Johns, and still hold Days of Judgement against him. So, for instance --

If I were going to start reading a Batman title, which one? Are they independent these days, or do you need to read them all?

Ditto, for Superman.

Who's writing Justice League nowadays? Is it any good?

Anything else going on I should know about? (Huck just mentioned a girl Robin.)

Oh, and Rucka's Batman: Death & the Maidens mini-series is almost over, I've been enjoying it (although some of the art good pretty bad for a few issues there).

Gotham Central is brilliant, but it's about the police force and Batman only physically shows up for a few panels every couple of issues, it seems.

Hated Superman the character or Supes as he's written? I dig the character, but he's so easy to get wrong -- having multiple Superman titles always seems like the biggest mistake because the odds of getting even one title really well-written are so slim.

Other than that, the best Superman stuff seems to be about a young Superman who's still finding himself, a la Superman of All Seasons, etc., which is the other dodge around the "he's just too powerful to be interesting" problem.

I am, however, anxiously awaiting the destruction of Alan Moore's Tom Strong universe in Promethea.

I'm looking forward to starting Moore's Top 10.

Also, I'm a sap so poignant equals good.

I am so ready to start a comic review blog.

But, yeah, I don't see that ever getting collected for any non-completist reason.

Actually it was better than the PAD Hulk which similarly ran out of steam but instead of getting entertainingly stupid just fell in love with its own concepts (boring boring Pantheon) and fizzled out.

What is Dan banging?

Tep: THE ONE WHERE THEY DRESS UP AS WOMEN TO INFILTRATE A BOAT FULL OF FEMALE SUPERVILLAINS!!!!!